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Chinese telecom giant jams Obama

Huawei refused to divest itself of parts of 3Leaf Systems, a California-based server company Monday. |
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Plummer, who took over Huawei's two-year-old Washington shop last summer after several years at Nokia, calls the missive the latest example of unfounded, inflammatory rhetoric. "It's like pick as many boogeymen as you can and throw them into the same sentence," Plummer told POLITICO. "The Taliban is hardly operating a wireless network."

He says much of the criticism of Huawei amounts to "knee-jerk protectionism behind a veil of security concerns" and "Sinophobia."

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But Huawei has failed to persuade lawmakers or administration officials, despite enlisting former congressmen to lobby Capitol Hill and hiring a top PR firm to do communications.

Huawei spent $750,000 in 2009 and 2010 on lobbying, according to disclosure forms. Its hires included former Democratic Reps. Don Bonker of APCO Worldwide and Max Sandlin of International Government Relations Group. Fleishman-Hillard was brought on board for PR. (Burson-Marsteller, is also doing some communications work on a lawsuit the company filed recently against Motorola).

Huawei also has or recently had some prominent Washington law firms on its payroll, including Arnold Porter, Skadden Arps, and Covington & Burling.

Foreign companies are barred from contributing to U.S. campaigns, but a handful of Huawei's U.S.-based employees made $2,550 in political donations from 2007 to 2010, including $1,000 to Rep. Fred Upton (R-Mich.) last year and $300 to Barack Obama in 2008.

Meanwhile Amerilink Telecom, a Kansas startup that teamed up with Huawei on its Sprint bid and attempted to assuage security concerns, boasted a roster of Washington dignitaries. Among those appointed to its board last year were Dick Gephardt, former World Bank President James Wolfensohn and former Deputy Secretary of Defense Gordon England. Amerilink paid $110,000 to Glover Park Group last year for lobbying, reports show.

Plummer acknowledged that the company hasn't been the savviest Washington operator. "The ambitious truth-telling initiative that we launched is less than a year old, but it's starting to see traction" among some lawmakers whom he declined to name.

Plummer is quick to rattle off statistics that he says should win Huawei respect. The company employs 1,200 in the U.S., split between Texas and California. It purchased more than $6 billion in equipment and services last year from U.S. multinationals such as Qualcomm, Oracle and IBM, he said. And there have been no major security issues, Plummer said, in the many other countries where it has done work.

"Huawei should be a poster child for a 21st century multinational with a Chinese heritage," Plummer said. "It should be celebrated."

But two experts in U.S.-China relations told POLITICO that allowing Huawei to install major telecom infrastructure raises legitimate security issues for the U.S. Those concerns aren't likely to subside any time soon, given the strained and complicated relationship between the two economic superpowers and the global nature of the telecom equipment supply chain; China is a major manufacturer of components of telecom equipment sold by other firms. With Huawei, though, the questions are particularly pointed.

"You have a few wrinkles," said Ken Lieberthal, director of the Brookings Institution's John L. Thornton China Center. "One is that there have been very persistent suspicions that Huawei enjoys military backing in China of one sort or another. The owner and founder came out of the Chinese military. And their finances are not sufficiently transparent to fully clear up the question whether there is" excessive government involvement.

Readers' Comments (18)

Its bad enough we send all our money and many of our jobs to China. Its bad enough that were at the whims of their monetary policies. But now we should be putting our foot down and say no to letting the Chinese gain controls over important parts of our economy and security. Our globalization madness is coming home to roost.

If You want to make gains in America all you have to do is pack a suitcase full of money, head for the White House oval office and sat down with Mubarak Obama. With all the ACORN training I am sure he will be very helpful and grateful.

I would like to think of a nice name to call LIBERALS. Can someone out there please help me? The only one I can think of thats really close to the truth is Scumbags.

WASHINGTON, Jan. 10 (HalliburtonWatch.org) -- Halliburton admitted today that it expanded economic relations with Iran despite the Bush administration's insistence that the nation finances terrorism. A Halliburton subsidiary incorporated in the Cayman Islands, along with an Iranian firm known as Oriental Kish, will help Iran's Pars Oil and Gas Co. develop an estimated 280 trillion to 500 trillion cubic feet of natural gas in Iran's ocean waters.

"Halliburton and Oriental Kish are the final winners of the tender for drilling South Pars phases 9 and 10," Pars Oil and Gas Co. managing director Akbar Torkan told Iranian state television, Agence France Press reported from Tehran, Iran.

Halliburton's Cayman Islands subsidiary, known as Halliburton Products & Services, won the contract from Iran. The subsidiary has been working in the country on many phases of the Pars project for a number of years.

According to today's Houston Chronicle, Halliburton Products & Services has its headquarters in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, and historically has been selling $30 million to $40 million worth of oil-field services and equipment to customers in Iran annually.

Halliburton "sold nuclear technology to Iran"

Senate hearing on foreign subsidiaries of U.S. companies dealing with Iran

Halliburton, the notorious U.S. energy company, sold key nuclear-reactor components to a private Iranian oil company called Oriental Oil Kish as recently as 2005, using offshore subsidiaries to circumvent U.S. sanctions. This clip shows Democratic Senators Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ) and Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio) grilling Sherry Williams, V.P. and Corporate Secretary for Halliburton about the company's deplorable ethics and questionable practices.

Liberals do you really know why all american jobs are going oversea? Would you rather hire and employee at $2 a day or $10 an hour? Would you rather hire employees not required to have health insurance or shell out $60-$100 a month to insure each employee? Would you rather pay no company federal and state taxes or 60-80 of profit in taxes? TAXES, TAXES, TAXES IS WHY AMERICA IS LOSING BUSINESSES TO CHINA, INDIA AND THE REST OF THE WORLD. Investors want to make money not support a worthless government.

To be a idiot has to be a requirement to be a Liberal but then they do not own businesses or pay taxes. Thir chiefs become wealthy off donations from the lazy, worthless and unions who want the working taxpayers to continue to support them.

So it is up to Obama! The Chinese government has found a way to take over the US without firing a shot. They bought and paid for Bill Clinton without any kickback from us and now they are moving ahead with just buying up the US Companies and all that prevents this is Obama! America what have we done in 2008 elections??? The question in the Bill Clinton years was would you let him stay with your underage daughter overnight and now the question is will you allow Obama to decide if this country is to remain free? Frightening thought.

The PLA has it's hands in every industry in China. They will continue to try to gain control of or at least get access to critical industries in the West. They do this to access our industrial secrets while keeping any new developments they may create within their own hands. China has the money and the West is for sale!

Our politicians and many business owners, are complete fools....unless their plan is to end the USA as we know it.

China just bought into a south Tx. oil & gas field. No matter that drilling is going on off of Cuba, or that we loaned $$$ Mexico and Brazil to drill for their oil....Obama has banned oil drilling and coal mining here!

More jobs lost.

Plus , Obama has a deal with Mexico now, and ID program for Mexicans, where they can come and travel throughout our country and work.....in 2009 our elites allowed 1.2 million VISA workers to come here and work.

You think this helps our out-of-work citizens?

Just who do our politicians and business owners help more....I can tell you it is not America or her citizens!

I don't care which Party.......I want them to know globalization has only helped a handful here!

As 3 leaders in the EU have said, "multiculturalism has failed"....so has globalization!

We citizens do not matter enough to have our voices heard in this issue!

madashellinAZ - You were being sarcastic, right? "This is what America got for voting in a community organizer and not a seasoned politician." Your myopia sees only "community organizer" because that's what Sarah and Rush like to throw around. A large majority of the US voted in a Constitutional law professor, US Senator and exceptionally intelligent human being. Do you consider Palin a "seasoned politician"? McCain was seasoned to the point of beginning to grow fuzz mold on his frontal lobe.

Sorry, Sarah and Rush did not create the label community organizer for dumbo. That is what he called himself. As for a large majority of the US voting for a constitutional law professor, US senator and exceptionally talented human being. If that was so how did Obama win? The only proof of law professor is a so called "job", yet no school records released to even prove he graduated. He was a US senator that voted present most of the time and did nothing. He sponsored nothing. As for intelligent human being? Maybe if you count the fact with the leftist press he HOODWINKED the majority of Americans.

I am hoping this time the name calling and leftist rhetoric is not listened to and people actually get some facts to vote with. One can only hope.

If all voters continue to be as myopic and lemming like as poster Anita Page. This country is doomed.

China would still be in the dark if it was not for george bush and bill clinton on the pushing and signing of the naft adgreetment. American business took all the secrets and machines to china for cheap labor. Now we pay a big price. Another republican great plan, some should be tried for treason.

Our leaders and our business 'leaders' are FOOLS to do business with China. They steal our technology, spy on us... and the thought of allowing them to supply equipment for our critical telecom infrastructure sends shivers down my spine. I think it was very symbolic today that the NYSE is selling out to the German Bourse.... The very definition and beacon of United States capitalism in which the 'leaders' SELL OUT because they are SIMPS that cannot compete or are afraid to compete. This is symbolic of the decline and SELLING OUT of our great nation by both greedy politicians and stupid corporate leaders that are too selfish and stupid to compete. Isnt that what capitalism is about? COMPETING instead of selling out? I guess not anymore... The business schools in this nation should all be ashamed of themselves for pumping out such TERRIBLE greedy CEO's. I think we really need to go back to having companies PRIVATELY held... where the family takes pride in competing and worries more about its name and perceived quality. The corporation of today is full of a bunch of idiots that are just a bunch of SELL OUTS that are more worried about stuffing their pockets full of cash than actually building a quality product. Heck.. we (the USA) don't even 'build' many of the products anymore... we simply have someone else do it.. with NO VALUE ADDED.. meanwhile.. even if we develop the technology... the competitors HAVE IT TOO because the fools / bean counters GAVE it all away. CHINA is NOT our friend and never will be. They are ruthless businessmen that will STEAL whatever technology they need to to dominate a particular market. Donald Trump has it right on this one.. they are playing us for FOOLS and we are all too compliant... Just ask Russia how it worked out for them.... China purchased Russia's most advanced fighter jet for a few years...... then CLONED it and started selling their own version on the open market. D'OH.... and just what does everyone else think is happening with every single other piece of technology we send to them!